Justice Alito Says He Has a Hunch Who Leaked the Dobbs Report

 

Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito told Fox News’s Shannon Bream that he has a hunch who leaked the controversial Dobbs decision before it was made public.

The 2022 Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization case authored by Alito effectively overturned Roe v. Wade, which had guaranteed abortion rights for nearly half a century.

Alito justified the opinion by stating that since abortion was illegal in 1868, it was never meant to be a constitutional right.

“I know this is very controversial but I thought it was perfectly clear, that the reference to liberty in the 14th Amendment adopted in 1868 did not mean that there is a constitutional right to abortion,” Alito said.

“In 1868, abortion was illegal in most of the states. And so it is unthinkable those states would ratify an amendment that rendered their own laws unconstitutional, and then continue to have those laws on the books for decades after that,” Alito said. “So, although that was a controversial decision and an important one, I think their originalism provided a clear answer.”

Bream asked about the backlash the justices received over the Dobbs decision.

“I anticipated that it would anger a great many people who believed and continue to believe strongly that there should be a constitutional right to abortion. So I understood that,” Alito said.

He continued:

I was not surprised there was such a reaction, I did not anticipate the particulars the forms that reaction would take. The most extreme forms. And I never dreamed the draft of the opinion would be leaked. That was totally unprecedented in the history of the country. It was a grave breach of the trust that everybody who worked in this building had before that point. It very predictably made the five of us in the majority targets for assassination. And nearly resulted in the assassination of my colleague Brett Kavanaugh.

“You have an opinion about who you think the leaker was?” Bream asked.

“I do have an opinion. But the evidence available at this time is not strong enough for the court, or for me, to say.”

Watch the clip above via Fox News Sunday.

The Mediaite One-Sheet "Newsletter of Newsletters"
The single summary and analysis of what the many, many media newsletters are saying and reporting from both sides of the aisle. Subscribe now!

Tags: